Unity and Clarity in Afghanistan

Network News

Democrats and Republicans have spent the past two years sparring with each other on key aspects of the effort to rebuild Afghanistan. We have disagreed on such issues as whether to spray the poppy crop with chemicals and whether President Hamid Karzai and his friends are too corrupt. But as Afghanistan has deteriorated significantly during this time, we have also come to realize that we share some core beliefs. As the administration completes its strategic review of Afghanistan policy, I urge Democrats and Republicans, our allies abroad, and the Karzai government to come together on key points before it is too late:

-- More troops, but with the right mission. President Obama has ordered 17,000 additional troops sent to Afghanistan. While more troops are needed to train the Afghan national army (and more civilian trainers -- not troops -- are needed to train the civilian police forces), additional troops risk invigorating the insurgency by increasing the number of civilian casualties. Civilian casualties are the single greatest reason we are losing support among the Afghan people and their government. U.S. commanders need to make clear that our primary mission in Afghanistan is to provide security to the people -- and that mission trumps pursuing terrorists in cases where the latter effort interferes with the former. A secure people will help us root out terrorists.

-- Public diplomacy in Europe. Some U.S. allies have largely maintained their effort in Afghanistan as a way to cooperate with the United States despite opposing the war in Iraq. They defined whatever mission their publics would accept, and NATO accepted that incoherence as the price of cooperation. Obama needs to get Europeans to understand that the most immediate threat to peace is the globalized extremism developing in Afghanistan and Pakistan, which has already reached into Europe. Greater dialogue will result in a more unified European commitment and possibly more troops.

-- Restructured development assistance. Karzai complained late last year that NATO's provincial reconstruction teams (PRTs) constitute a "parallel government." The PRTs are a lottery; how much aid a province gets depends on the budget of the country commanding the PRT -- which could be the United States or Lithuania. Meanwhile, donors complain that they cannot go through the government in Kabul because its ministries are corrupt and slow-moving. Overall, the PRT structure distorts Afghan national priorities and conflicts with the government's structure. Working through community development councils to implement national programs under the general oversight of the Kabul government would allow the international community to fund what communities need rather than what allied nations can spare. This approach would affirm the political leadership of the central government while allowing communities to take ownership of reconstruction efforts and reduce costs.

-- Limited engagement with Iran. The Obama administration has taken the right step in saying it would engage with Tehran regarding Afghanistan -- but the engagement should be narrow in focus. When the United States branded Iran a part of "an axis of evil" while relying on Pakistan, which had basically created the Taliban, hard-liners gained the upper hand in Tehran. Iran, a nation of Shiite Muslims, derives no ideological or military benefit from supporting an extremist Sunni Muslim movement. Limited confidence-building efforts regarding Iran should begin with Afghanistan's drug trade, which funds the insurgency that is killing Americans. With over 50 percent of the Afghan opium trade transiting Iran, an estimated 3 million Iranians, mostly young people, are using heroin, morphine and opium. This common problem could be a starting point to a more productive relationship.

-- More effective engagement with Pakistan. Pakistanis believe that the United States propped up a military dictatorship to pursue its war against terrorism at the expense of their national interests. The democratically elected civilian government is trying to persuade its military and people that terrorist extremism and poverty are greater threats than India or the United States. We must financially support the new civilian government. Then we can work with it to finally end the Pakistani military and intelligence services' longtime partnership with armed militants and terrorists, and to integrate the tribal areas where these groups are based into the mainstream administration of the Pakistani state.